We've always been intrigued by the EFI-X dongle that fools OS X into running on stock Intel machines, Software Update and all, and now it looks like the company a company called EFi-X USA is taking things one step further -- it's planning on shipping pre-built machines capable of running Apple's OS. The EFi-X Millennium 4 will sport an overclocked 3.8GHz Core 2 Quad, 4GB of RAM, and a GeForce 8800 GTS graphics card in an Antec P180 case, all for $1,899 plus the $199 EFi-X dongle. The idea is to avoid any Psystar-style legal troubles by leaving the purchase and installation of OS X up to the end user, but apparently no one at EFi-X USA has talked to a lawyer or even read our previous posts on the matter, since Apple's lawsuit against Psystar turns as much on contributory and induced copyright infringement as it does on Psystar's direct violation of Apple's OS X EULA. In other words, it's illegal to sell a product expressly designed to allow customers to infringe copyrights -- a principle Napster and Grokster made famous, you'll recall. Plus we're pretty certain there's a DMCA argument in there since the EFi-X dongle circumvents Apple's protections on OS X -- the validity of which Psystar is actually testing in its revised countersuit. We'll see how it goes -- we're seriously worried that these companies are doing far more harm to the OSx86 scene than good.

P.S.- Oh, and honestly, Apple, if you want this entire headache to go away, all you have to do is produce a reasonably-priced, configurable midrange tower. Think about it.

Update: We've just been pinged by the original EFi-X team, who tell us that EFi-X USA has nothing to do with them, that they have no plans to sell actual machines, and that they strongly disapprove of EFi-X USA. Shades of Psystar's use of netkas's work on OSx86 without permission, we'd say -- shady shady.